


Eye of the Beholder

by PatchworkIdeas



Series: WinterFRE 2020 [15]
Category: The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Not Related, Blessings, Curses, Gen, Happy Ending, Non-Graphic Violence, Now with a gorgeous Photoset made by the amazing Linane!, Old Gods
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-22
Updated: 2020-02-22
Packaged: 2021-02-27 18:43:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,155
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22850425
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PatchworkIdeas/pseuds/PatchworkIdeas
Summary: Kili couldn’t remember how often he died.There had been so many deaths that the memories bled into one another; an endless, bloody cycle.
Relationships: Fíli/Kíli (Tolkien)
Series: WinterFRE 2020 [15]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1604650
Comments: 9
Kudos: 45
Collections: GatheringFiKi - Winter FRE 2020





	Eye of the Beholder

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Prompt Nr.80:  
> “That’s twice that you’ve killed me now. Shall we go for round three?”
> 
> [Linane](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Linane/pseuds/Linane) made me a wonderful Photoset for this story! It's so perfect I just had to share it with you all!  
> Posted here with permission, and original found [here](https://linane-art.tumblr.com/post/613286843302248448/why-do-you-do-this-if-you-dont-want-to-kili).  
> Thank you so, so much darling!❤️

* * *

Kili couldn’t remember how often he died.  
There had been so many deaths that the memories bled into one another; an endless, bloody cycle.  
The first years had been the worst: Kili had been unwilling to fight, unwilling to kill; innocent and cursed all the same.  
He hadn’t asked that women to fall in love with him, hadn’t even really known her, much less returned her feelings.  
But she had spurned a god’s attention and Kili had paid the price – the god’s wrath endless and merciless, cursing Kili for the beauty he had been born with. 

He felt the blood rushing out of yet another fatal wound, felt his body failing, disintegrating, leaving him scattered, consciousness screaming while he was pulled apart and put together in yet another form - never the same, never anything but a hideous monster.  
And he was a monster. An undying monster that got reborn as another, time and time again.  
Kili didn’t remember his first kill, just remembered not wanting to die yet again for the crime of existing.

-

Heroes were all the same.  
They saw, they attacked, they either killed or were killed in return.  
They never, ever left.

If they thought themselves especially witty, they would challenge Kili first, bellow to the heavens about how they would wreak vengeance for his countless misdeeds.  
They never could tell him what those misdeeds were when asked, though at least their shock that he could speak made them easier to kill more often than not.

It was highly, highly embarrassing that the same tactic could apparently be used against him.  
In his defense, nobody had ever started to rant at him mid-fight about the bad quality of the restaurant in a nearby city or how badly paid hero work apparently was.  
The sword unerringly found Kili’s heart in the spare second it took him to try and figure out what was even happening.  
The last thing he heard before his body and consciousness were scattered to the winds, howling in agony, was:

“I’m so tired of this.”

His last thought before his mind was torn asunder was that the hero sounded almost as resigned as Kili felt.

-

Against all odds, Kili met the hero again.

It wasn’t often that he saw a hero twice – Kili was blown to all corners of the world with each new rebirth, stuck into all kinds of horrifying new forms, some worse than others. No body had ever been the same, but occasionally parts at least would be familiar, like the angry god was starting to run out of ideas to torture him with.  
Kili idly wondered if the god was cursing him all over again for getting killed so often, necessitating a new monstrous idea each time. At least the main body was somewhat normal this time, just 4 legs and a tail, even if the 3 heads where definitely hard to learn to control. He embarrassingly kept running his heads into each other those first wretched months. And the addition of new ones growing after he lost one hadn’t made that any easier…

Not that any of the idiots challenging him lived long enough to tell anyone.  
But it was hard to keep track of the years when everyone Kili met tried to kill him, not at all interested in chatting with a monster.

So this time, instead of being surprised by the hero’s unusual rant – something about how uncomfortable the new fashions were and how much the hero missed his first armor – Kili interrupted him and asked, “What year is it?” bringing the hero to a stop, wide-eyed and confused.

Kili could have killed the him then, as he himself had been killed before.  
He didn’t.  
The hero was fascinating – and Kili did kinda want to have an answer.  
So he swiftly disarmed him, tossing the sword away and looking at the flabbergasted hero. Three of his heads hissed in amusement, a forth licked his lips. Another, not as committed to the fight, took note of blond hair and pretty blue eyes and, darn if he wasn’t cursed he would tap that any day.

Maybe it was karma that that was the moment the sword somehow ended up in Kili’s heart, despite the fact that he had definitely divested the hero of it and the hero, as far as Kili was aware, hadn’t actually moved. He saw the confusion on that pretty face turn to grieve, felt his heads start to disintegrate one by one.  
But with how many of them Kili had, he had a short moment for once, so he concentrated, a more important question haunting him, more pressing than his own inevitable death. 

“Why do you do this if you don’t want to?” Kili asked the hero, making sure to keep his eyes on him despite the overwhelming pain. He had long since stopped praying to the gods, but Kili found himself hoping for a quick answer anyway.  
The hero seemed to understand.

“Because I don’t have a choice.” There was desperation there, a pain old and deep and familiar.  
Kili felt his last head start to turn to ashes in the wind, his own response little more than a whisper:

“Then we are not so different, you and I.”

-

Kili was born anew - with tentacles. Or what might be tentacles.  
(What was he supposed to do with _tentacles_?!)  
He tried to tell the idiots who hunted him that it wasn’t worth it, to just leave him alone already!  
He didn’t even kill them, just let them go, the image of blond hair and blue eyes and a pain so like his own still stuck in his mind.  
The hunters banded together and tore him apart limb by limb.

-

Kili licked his black scales clean of the red blood marring it, the spear already pulled out with his teeth. At least this time he only had one head. He was big, and powerful, with wings he didn’t dare use because they would just bring him more attention that he wanted.  
He had almost gotten to like this form.  
Too bad he wouldn’t get to keep it.  
Because here he was again, that same hero.  
The same blond hair, the same blue eyes, just different armor and a different sword, held loose at the hero’s side.

Kili already knew he wouldn’t kill him.

This hero wasn’t like the others. Kili still didn’t know what year it was, but he wasn’t stupid – they had passed. And they had passed the hero by, unable or unwilling to mar his skin or to turn his golden hair silver.  
Kili would willingly lose a thousand comfortable forms if it meant he could have a familiar face in this bloody play they were forced to take part in.  
But the hero didn’t move. Didn’t start another tirade, only waited, watched.  
Perhaps waiting for confirmation, for some sign, that Kili was more than just another thoughtless monster.

“That’s twice that you have killed me now. Shall we go for round three?”

Kili didn’t want to fight the hero, but what else was there anymore? Still, Kili kept his voice friendly, inviting, like they were talking about a game of chess rather than yet more pain and blood and senseless death.  
He didn’t move toward the hero, just put his head down on his paws, long, thin tongue flickering out once in a move that wasn’t quite voluntary.  
He smelled no fear on the hero.  
He wasn’t surprised.  
Yet.

“Why do you kill people?”

“Why do people keep trying to kill me?” Kili answered, trying for bored, even though he was excited, oh so excited, for his first real conversation in forever.  
“I have never attacked anyone who did not try to kill me first.” He added, just to be clear, because that was important to him, to what little humanity he still had left after everything he was forced to become.  
It wouldn’t matter, it never did, but he wanted it be heard the one time someone was willing to listen.  
And, wonder of wonders, the hero did listen.  
Kili saw the hero’s shoulders relax, his stance shifting just that bit from readiness into something else.

“You won’t attack me? Or anyone else, as long as they don’t attack you first?” The hero clarified, sheathing his sword upon Kili’s confirmation.

The blond slowly stepped toward him, eyes never leaving his, and Kili could feel his tail twitch, kept still through nothing but willpower and a fear of breaking the moment.  
He didn’t know what was happening, if it was just a ploy, if this was _real_ after all the years of no one ever seeing more than skin deep.  
The hero raised his hand, dwarfed by the dragon before him, but Kili just closed his eyes, rumbling, enjoying the warmth seeping into him where skin met scale.  
His first friendly touch in longer than he could remember.  
Maybe it was silly, but he would die a thousand times more if the hero just touched him this way each time, before he killed Kili.

“You are innocent.” The hero breathed, a note of wonder, of hope in a butter soft voice. Kili’s eyes shot open upon the unexpected absolution.  
The hero’s face had lit up, made him seem younger, eyes big and round and all on Kili. 

Nobody had ever looked at him that way. 

Kili never wanted this moment to end, considered lying, considered not saying anything at all.  
But in the end, he couldn’t bring himself to betray the fledgling trust growing between them, the first he had ever been offered.

“I used to be, once upon a time. Before-” Kili swallowed, teeth showing for just a second, a grimace he couldn’t prevent forming, because he had never been able to talk about the pain of his curse, the pain of what had been _done to him_ , and he couldn’t find the words now that it might matter. 

Except it didn’t.  
Not anymore.  
He had killed.  
He had become the monster he’d been forced to be.

“-Before everything. I doubt anyone could call me innocent now.” Kili’s voice was mournful, wistful, but he added, so that there could be no doubt: “I won’t fight you. Not you. Thank you for seeing past the monster I have been forced to become.”

The hero was silent for a long time, looking at Kili with inscrutable eyes.  
In the end, the hero pulled his sword, and Kili mourned, but moved to let the hero have access to his heart anyway. It would never be fast, but it felt fitting nonetheless.  
Except that the hero just laughed at him, a short huff of air, before sinking to one knee, the sword held up before him, an offering.

“I, Fili the Undying, Protector of the Innocent, vow to keep you safe.  
You have been beset by hordes of barbarians, calling for your blood for no reason but their own lust for glory. I will set this right; I will not rest until you are safe for the rest of your days.”

Well.  
What was he supposed to say to that? Happy to be your Draconic Damsel in Distress?  
He settled on: “My name is Kili. And _what_?”

-

Fili had been Blessed, a word that sounded like a curse when it fell from his fair lips.  
He would always, always win.  
No matter the enemy.  
Be it human, monster, even something as abstract as time itself.  
He. Could. Not. Lose.

Even if he wanted to.

He had far outlived anyone he knew, as well as their children and children's children. Not that he was able to spend much time with them when they were still alive.  
His blessing came with a duty – he had to protect innocents wherever he found them, until they were safe. He would take care of one threat, stay maybe a few days before he heard of the next and then he would be forced to move again - his body not his to control until he gave in and stopped fighting his call.  
He had seen kingdoms rise and fall and had not rested since before them.  
He never would.

It was the cruelest Blessing Kili had ever heard of, so like and yet so different from his own Curse that it broke his heart.

Kili wasn’t truly innocent. But he was innocent enough that Fili had a choice. A choice between slaying him, a monster that was a danger to others – or protecting him from the world and those stupid enough to challenge Fili for a dragon that only wished to live.  
It was the first true choice in this matter that Fili had apparently been allowed to make for as long as he could remember, his Blessing not tugging him either way, and Fili had chosen him.  
It was a humbling thought.

But it was not that easy.

Fili stayed with him, intending to tell the next hero the truth, and the next, and the next, until the news would spread that Kili was Benevolent, and should be left alone.

(After which Fili would leave, would have to, and Kili already knew he would go with him, the peace he had longed for be damned if only he could keep his company. If only they didn’t have to be _alone_ anymore.)

Kili tried to warn him that it wouldn’t work. It never did.  
Heroes didn’t listen.

And this time, Fili proved him right, for he didn’t.  
And, as Kili had predicted, Fili was forced to fight the other heroes.  
Fili beat them - and let them go.  
More came.  
Fili got more and more stringent with them, to note that the dragon wasn’t fighting, wasn’t hurting anyone.  
Kili tried to warn Fili that he had tried that, too.  
And as always, the attackers came back, in masses, calling Fili a traitor, in leagues with the monster responsible for all their woes, be it bad crops, children gone missing or whatever else had befallen the land.  
Humans needed scapegoats.  
Monsters were easy.

Where Fili had once been revered as a demigod, a protector of the people, he was now cursed as a demon who had bewitched the people before, who had to be purged from the land as much as the dragon he protected.  
They came with pitchforks and swords, some in armor, some without.  
Fili let run who would, but his Blessing held true.  
When the night ended, Fili stood in a sea of blood, of people he would have once considered innocents until they came at him like bloodthirsty monsters, hungry for death.

Fili had to protect the innocent.  
He had to protect Kili.  
He **couldn’t** lose.

Kili curled around him, hiding Fili with his wings, licking the blood and the tears from Fili’s skin while his hero fell apart and screamed his grief to the heavens.

Kili hadn’t wanted any of this.  
Hadn’t wanted his Curse to infect anyone else.

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry” Kili whispered, warm breath stirring Fili’s blood tangled hair.  
He hadn’t expected an answer, but-

“It’s not your fault.” Fili’s voice raw and rough, nothing more than a whisper, run down from seemingly endless screaming. Fili hadn’t lost it. He never lost anything. Regardless of how it felt.

When the sun kissed the bloody ground Kili spread his wings for the first time, taking him and his hero up into the sky. Far, far away from unseeing eyes, monsters in human form and the terrifying realization that innocence, like so many things, lay in the eye of the beholder.

-

Fili disarmed the attacker with a twist of his wrist, catching the sword with his free hand and pining the lad beneath him in one fell swoop.  
This was the fifth time this particular boy had come to challenge the Monk of the Seal and Fili was beginning to think the lad was more interested in getting trained by him than in actually slaying Kili.  
Fili liked the lad, gave him some pointers on his stance and how to better keep a grip on his sword before sending him on his way, winded but eager to return.

It hadn’t always been that way.  
They had eventually found a giant cave system, infested by an actual monster, a being that demanded sacrifices and blood and that none had been able to slay, and had made their home in it after taking care of the vermin.

It was perfect. 

The legends of the beast’s power were known far and wide and while plenty still tried their hand at it, most folks had long since given up trying to destroy the beast, instead simply trying to survive it.  
And in had come Fili, blessed by the gods, saying he had put a seal on the beast.

It slumbered deep in the caves during the day now, but he would have to return each night to redo the seal, caught in an endless struggle between good and evil.  
He was a protector of the innocents, and while he hoped to someday find someone who could take his place, maybe even slay the monster for good, he could not in good conscience allow any to enter the cave that could not beat him, could not prove they were stronger than him. 

After all, if they couldn’t beat Fili, how did they wish to have any chance against what he could only stall?

The lands around celebrated him as a hero, finally free of the human sacrifices and blood and pain inflicted on any who did not heed the beast’s call for offerings.  
Fili was brought food and drink so that he could continue his task without worry, as well as materials to further close the cave, to create a barrier that would hopefully hold the beast for all eternity if anything would ever happen to him.  
The challengers themselves provided him with gold and weapons to hoard, for surely, if they had the armor and weapons needed to even stand a chance, they would have the coin to spare a monk that was testing them for their own protection.

They could have their money back if they won...

As such, Fili and Kili had built themselves a quiet, comfortable nest over the years, with a second entrance, carefully blocked with a boulder, to enjoy the open sky on moonless nights and otherwise explored the endless winding tunnels of the cave systems with all the wonders they held.  
They spent nights enjoying each other’s company, Fili telling Kili about another challenger or a particularly interesting story he had heard, and Kili mentioning anything new he had found in the tomes hidden by the former occupant.  
Spell tomes, among others.  
Kili didn’t have much of a hand for it, but it was not like either of them were short on time.

All together, there were worse ways to spend eternity.  
And no one better to spend it with.


End file.
